In the last decade of the last century, Joe changed many more lives than he ever knew.  During those years, Donna and I were advocates for families with children with disabilities, something we couldn't have done without Joe's yeoman support.  Donna missed work, Joe supported her.  We would travel the hinterlands of New Jersey for long meetings with groups of parents, training them to stand up for their children, who, quite frankly, were being shafted, pushed to the backwaters of education.  And when those meetings were done, we would have to fight our way through the parking lot because the parents were desparate for someone, anyone, to talk to them, understand them, and help them.  Getting home at nine or ten was an early night.  Joe would cook dinner, or fire up the barbeque, or do many other tasks that Donna never asked him to do.  The parents would find out where Donna lived and show up at her door at all hours, and Joe would welcome them in.  Because of that support, Joe made it possible for Donna and I to do what we had to do.  Hundreds of families and more importantly, hundreds of children with developmental, emotional, learning, and behavioral differences got a fair shake and the respect they deserved.  We won a statewide award for what we did, but Donna and I gave the credit to our spouses.  One other story.  Christmas....1998 I think...Donna and kids arrive for Christmas dinner at our house.  About ten minutes later, my four boys with autism are surprised by a knock at the door.  Santa.  Joe.  Magic!  They will never forget him.

My traffic cone adventure: Joe was driving back to New Jersey. I made the mistake of falling asleep in the passenger seat. Out of a deep sleep I was awakened to a giant orange thing coming at my head with Joe laughing in the background.

Joe and I refused to retire from Sunday morning fraternity football. We played with kids up to ten years younger than us. We would forget our aches and pains with a beer and burger after the games as we watched the NFL football games.

Winter-Ice skating at Warinanco/South Mountain.
Spring-Back to the tennis court.

Joe was always one who greeted you with a smile and you knew he was genuinely happy to see you.

There was one person I looked up to and respected all through college. It was Joe.

My condolences to the family. So many more memories. I will never lose them.

Rest well my friend.

Hi Joe (Smokin Joe, The Glue),

We did have a lot of fun while working together at TransNet.  Even though I was a little disappointed at the beginning to find out that you were a Dodger fan, I knew you were a great guy from the beginning.  We had a lot of laughs especially when Manny was on vacation and we switched the numbers and letters on his keyboard.  We were roaring hysterically watching him get mad trying to input that day!  Also when the others were on vacation we would move their desks and hoist it into the warehouse racks.  Or shrink wrapping a co-workers car, or placing bags of the shipping peanuts at their desks or office (mine!), playing tapeball in the warehouse and getting caught in the act when the president of the company came back and saw us!  I think the funniest time was when Manny retired and we kept sending stuff to his house, even when we cleared out the location in Mountainside and loaded the stuff on his front steps!!!  I enjoyed talking to you the most, especially about our North Carolina vacations.  Of course you would always laugh when I would do a Howard Cosell "Down goes Festa, Down goes Festa".  It was great to have you here at Adept too.  I keep asking myself why you left us all so early, and the only conclusion I get is that God needed you in Heaven to touch everyone up there as you touched everyone down here.  You will be missed. 

When I pledged the fraternity of Nu Sigma Phi, Joe was the president.  One of the activities of pledging was a scavenger hunt.  There was a list of mostly goofy, embarrassing, and awkward things for us to procure in a short amount of time.  One of those items was a traffic cone from the Goethals Bridge.  It just so happened that I was in possession of one of those traffic cones at the time, and it would be quicker, and safer to use that one rather than have to go to the bridge and stea..,er, pick up another one.  How I came to be the owner of this purloined traffic control device is directly attributed to Joe.

When I arrived at Kean College, I knew no one except for my girlfriend.  I lived at home, she lived in the dorms.   Two of her roommates, belonged to a sorority, and those sorority members where friends with the brothers of Nu Sigma Phi.  At the time Joe was the president, and I met him through my girl friends roommates.  Joe was a big guy, with a barrel chest, to hold a heart the size of his no doubt, with a quick smile and easy laugh.  He was easy to like.  Joe also had a not so secret affinity for late night cruises across the New York harbor on the Staten Island Ferry.  One night, with little to do, Joe suggested we take a trip, and enjoy the sights from the ferry.  Well, it was more of a ‘come on, we’re going to the ferry’ than a suggestion, but it was hard to resist his enthusiasm.  So a few of us piled into Joe’s car and drove off into the night.  The trip to the ferry, and across the harbor wasn’t the most memorable part of the trip, there were a few other thing that make it stand out all these years later. 

There was a place of very low standards on the way home from the ferry, that was known to the Brothers of Nu Sigma Phi.  At one time it had a statue of a monster on the roof off the building, but it had fallen over.  Except for the legs.  Joe decided that this night would be a good time for a visit, and to introduce me to the place, on our way home.  So Joe pulls into the parking lot, right under those disembodied legs, up the front door.  There was an immediate and negative reaction from the feminine members of our party as Joe opened his car door and said “Well lets go in!”.  And being Joe, he was laughing like a maniac as he said it.  Needless to say, Joe was indeed just having fun with the girls.  We continued on.

Our trip home sent us back over the Goethals Bridge to New Jersey, and here is where things get just a bit darker.  As we approached the bridge, there were lots or those orange rubber traffic cones on the road, keeping order to the traffic on the bridge late at night.  As we entered on to the bridge, Joe, who was driving remember, slows, then stops his car.  What in the world is this guy doing? I wonder.  Do I have to get out and push?(Don’t forget this is the car of a college student)  In one smooth (and practiced) motion, Joe opens his door, grabs a cone, and toss’s it on to my lap in the back seat!  Even though we seemed to be alone, I was expecting to see blue and red lights behind us.  Joe, of course, was laughing.  Our night ended, and somehow or another, I ended up with the cone in the back seat of my car, and I was the proud owner of an orange traffic cone from the Goethals Bridge, courtesy of Mr. Joseph Festa.

So back to the night of our scavenger hunt.  We bring our booty back the brothers for examination.  They question if we have the traffic cone from the bridge.  Yup, got one right here, and I hold it up.  This being an object close to Joe’s heart, he questions its origin, “Wait a minute, HOW do we know it came from the Goethals Bridge?”  For this I had a ready answer “Joe, I was with you when you stole it!”  I’ll never forget the look on Joe’s face as he said, kind of meekly, “Oh, yeah…..”

I later found out, as I told my other brothers the story of how I got the cone, that I wasn’t Joe’s only accomplice in his quest to corner the traffic-cone-of–ill-repute market.  I wonder what his final tally was, and where are they all?

The world was better for having Joe in it, he will be missed.

Last time I was with Joe, we  were at an active/alumni softball game. I was razzing him all day about the baseball pants he was wearing. He kept apologizing throughout the day for being an old fart. Well that old fart played as well as any of the young bucks in our active fraternity and after razzing him about the baseball pants, I did admit to him he was the smartest one there for wearing them as there were a few guys with scrapes and bloody knees because they were wearing shorts. I also admitted to him that I almost did the same thing but opted to wear sweats so I would not get razzed all day by a punk like me LOL. We agreed that with age comes wisdom and the realization that shorts and softball aren't the smartest thing. I was lucky enough to be as smart as him for that day.

We shared a laugh (his beaming laugh I will never forget) as well as took a moment to pat ourselves on the back for being a part of the fraternity that brought so many great guys together. As humble as he was, he would never realize how truly great a man he was amongst really good men.  Fraternity to Eternity Uncle Festa.